


Der Lächelnde Mann

by 23Murasaki



Series: Everyone Lives! [24]
Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Agni is a nice person, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Backstory, Communication Failure, Everyone Has Issues, Gen, Gratuitous German, Grell is the only sensible person here and that's awful, Memory Alteration, Memory Loss, Sebastian actually blows his cover wide open, Sebastian is an idiot, Serial Killers, Suddenly Plot!, Undertaker still hasn't shown up, demoning is difficult, headcanons, is this even how slang works, no i swear no one dies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-08
Updated: 2016-01-24
Packaged: 2018-01-15 00:35:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 14,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1284640
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/23Murasaki/pseuds/23Murasaki
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sebastian is very good at ignoring things that he doesn't like until they can be ignored no longer. Faust shows up with a revelation of the 'can be ignored no longer' sort. Plot ensues, because I swear there is a reason to this AU.<br/>((Now with chapters, so all the plot-related stuff is in one place.))</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Um. You guys said you wanted plot, so... Here. Plot. That means less happy things than normal, though.

He didn’t know why Faust kept coming back. The invitation to nap in his kitchen, after all, had been a one-time event. Alright, two-time event, but the point stood. Despite this, the demon found Faust sitting in front of the kitchen door once again, face tucked against his knees and glasses most of the way up his forehead. This was ridiculous.  
  
“How long have you been here?” snapped the demon. Faust didn’t move. “If you make me repeat myself, I will put a fork through your head.” He wouldn’t, probably. It would be a waste of a fork. Faust shifted slightly.  
  
“... Long,” he mumbled. “... waited...” Further words were not forthcoming.  
  
“What in the world were you waiting for, then?” asked the demon. Faust was silent for nearly a minute.  
  
“... vergesse.” To forget. Faust’s voice was much too soft now, and the demon felt a stab of something unfamiliar in his chest. Had Faust’s memories been tampered with as well? He had not even considered the idea. He hadn’t even considered considering it, and had put the idea of gaps in his own memories as far from the front of his mind as he could.  
  
“Do you want to forget, or are you forgetting?” he asked instead. “You need to be clearer.”  
  
“... lost,” muttered Faust dazedly. “All... gone...” The unfamiliar stabbing feeling intensified, as if someone was twisting an invisible dagger. The demon brushed his hands over his chest automatically to check, but there was no actual wound, just the uncomfortable sensation and Faust curled helplessly at his feet in the dim light of a cloudy early morning.  
  
“Well, you cannot just sit there,” he reasoned. “If you don’t cause any trouble...” He wasn’t entirely sure how he wanted to finish that sentence.  
  
Regardless, Faust didn’t move. With a tired sigh, the demon hoisted him upright by the armpits. Faust slumped bonelessly against him, eyes unfocussed and expression vacant. At least he moved when he was prodded, and crumpled into the correct chair, silent and still. Demons were often still, and often silent, but rarely at the same time. The feeling of a knife in his chest didn’t go away. He kept checking if Faust was breathing, which was foolish, because demons were essentially immortal anyway, and it made him almost burn the scones. Eventually he gave up.  
  
“Faust. Händen,” he ordered, holding out one of his own hands as demonstration. It took Faust a moment to process and obey, but he held out his hands palms up. The demon deposited the boldest of his kittens on them. The kitten mewled uncomfortably and wriggled itself upright, bright blue eyes staring into Faust’s empty yellow ones.  
  
“... weich,” mumbled Faust. “Weich Katze.”  
  
“Yes,” agreed the demon. “Play nicely, now.” He got almost an hour’s peace from that, disregarding the time the kitten knocked Faust’s glasses off of his face with an impressively loud crash.  
  
“Here,” said Faust suddenly. His voice seemed a little stronger. The demon looked over curiously.  
  
“What?”  
  
“He was here,” Faust elaborated, carefully pronouncing each syllable. “He took them away. He was here.” The demon put down the bowl he was washing.  
  
“He took away your memories?” he prompted. Faust’s gaze was fixed on a point above his head.  
  
“Der Lächelnde Mann took them to pay,” Faust declared, and then slumped over. The kitten, which had been lying on his lap peacefully, hissed and darted away, startled. Faust’s limp hands were clammy to the touch, and he was barely breathing at all, and the nonexistent knife in the demon’s chest plunged dangerously deep, as if to carve out his heart. He froze in place as well, unsure of what to do or if he was supposed to do anything at all, half his mind still caught on the idea of der Lächelnde Mann. The Smiling Man. It had sounded more like title than a description, and as far as titles went it sounded like one out of a fable or some horror story. Why did it make him think of blood and sharp teeth...?  
  
Noises in the hallway knocked him back to reality. The other servants were talking loudly, and he could hear Finny’s laughter. It wouldn’t do for them to walk in on the butler standing over what appeared to be a corpse. Finny would panic, and the other would ask too many questions. He quickly hefted Faust’s limp body into his arms – it was much, much lighter than expected, given that Faust was taller than him and likely better-fed – and escaped out the other door. It only took a little bit of creative gymnastics to get into his room and deposit Faust on the generally unused bed, next to the folded green blanket that Agni had never taken back and a spare set of white gloves. That would have to do for the time being.  
  
It wasn’t anything like worry or fear of the Smiling Man that made him lock the doors and close the windows as tightly as he could and glance through the curtains at every single sign of movement and check on Faust every two hours. Demons had no reason to be paranoid. Around him, everything was normal. Meirin broke a plate and managed to fall down the stairs. Bard lit the stove on fire twice. The young master huffed and grumbled and played his violin all wrong.  
  
If the Smiling Man wanted his payment, he wouldn’t get it here. Sebastian, would fight him to the death for it. The shock of that realization made him stop in the middle of the hallway. He had never before in his life thought of himself by name.


	2. Chapter 2

He couldn’t bring himself to kill the spiders. Since Faust had collapsed, they had started to swarm the manor, and it seemed like for every one he deposited outside a window there were three others skittering across the wall. At one point he had thought he was rid of them, but it turned out that they had simply converged on his room, newly-spun webs arching over the bed where Faust lay like a delicate canopy. The spiders at least seemed willing to stay there, as if they were keeping a vigil. He rescued his spare gloves and the blanket and left them to it. There wasn’t much else he could do.  
  
Maybe he was thinking too much about memories. Too many flickered in front of his mind’s eye, out of context scenes from a cinematic record. Meirin on a roof, clutching a gun and looking through him because he was standing much to close for her to see. His young master upending a cup of poorly-made tea, still too skinny and covered in bruises. Finny staring dazedly around at the garden, skin turning pinkish-red from being out in the sunlight for the first time. Those incongruous memories of his own childhood, with Faust tagging along behind him in too-green fields. Snake, silent and pale on the side of the street, the one time the young master had gone to the opera and come back with a footman and three little green snakes. LLady Elizabeth laughing about something unimportant, her energy contagious enough that even the young master was hiding a smile.. Bard with a tiny bottle in his hand, promising to keep a secret that wasn’t real. A previous mistress, begging for one more month to live, if for nothing else than for her child, a wish he had granted. An ancient tomb, adorned with artifacts and treasures that surrounded a mummy in a sarcophagus, and a statue of a lion-goddess whose onyx stare made the demon want to turn around and flee. Sunset through glass walls, and the feeling of something coming loose inside his head as Agni smiled at him and promised friendship, whatever that honestly meant. A dream about cats and a house on a hill...  
  
He was too distracted to immediately notice the reaper in his kitchen window. Grell waved at him, pouted upon not receiving acknowledgement, and tried a different tactic.  
  
“Yoohoo~ Sebby-dearest~” she trilled. He nearly jumped out of his skin, and did manage to drop what he was holding and go at her head with a frying pan before he recognized her.  
  
“I thought I locked that window,” he muttered, staying his hand. He thought he had locked every window. Grell’s cheerful grin faded.  
  
“Uh, it was open when I got here,” she replied. “... You don’t look so good. Did that gent with the bandages do something?”  
  
“What?” It took the demon a full ten seconds to process that question. “What. No. He hasn’t anything to do with anything.”  
  
“That’s good, then,” said Grell, grinning from ear to ear once again. “Wouldn’t wanna have to do something deadly~”  
  
“Please don’t do anything deadly,” said the demon tiredly. He was tired, he realized. He was tired and parts of his body he had not been previously aware of were sore. Grell peered at him from the window ledge.  
  
“Something’s up.” That was an understatement that he half-expected to hear turn into a sexual innuendo. To her credit, Grell did no such thing this time. “You wanna talk about it?”  
  
“Um,” said the demon. He didn’t know where to start and he was fairly sure Grell wasn’t the right... creature to talk to anyway. Still, she probably wouldn’t leave until she got what she wanted. “Does ‘the Smiling Man’ mean anything to you?”  
  
“The Smiling Man?” Grell echoed, twirling a lock of very red hair around her finger. “It sounds like a fable or something. Don’t go out after dark, kiddies, or the Smiling Man’ll get you~!”  
  
“Yes, it does sound rather silly, doesn’t it?” mused the demon. Grell shrugged.  
  
“I mean, those stories are all based on something, you know? I’d bet there are demons somewhere that lurk around waiting for their victims to walk into them.” It sounded like Faust’s style, actually. He tried not to think about that. “And I mean, there’s always serial killers and the like. Lots of things a human should be scared of.”  
  
“I suppose,” said the demon. Grell seemed to be warming to her topic.  
  
“Mind, if you’re the one who’s scared of the Smiling Man, he wouldn’t be a demon, right?” said Grell. The demon blinked. He had not truly considered that. “What sort of thing would scare a demon, I wonder~”  
  
“Demons fear nothing,” he replied. Someone fanciful could say that demons were the root of all fears. Grell stared at him curiously.  
  
“That’s a lie. You fear me, don’t you?” Her voice had dropped, and all of the affected, girlish mannerisms were gone, and for a split second it was the Ripper who sat on his windowsill and he jerked back on pure instinct. Grell grinned viciously. “You fear death. You fear losing. You fear anything that is stronger than you.”  
  
“Nothing is stronger than I am,” replied the demon. He had never lost a fight. Despite this, unpleasant memories surfaced. The lioness statue with onyx eyes. Grell in an alleyway, all teeth and red and signs of danger. Faraway screaming and the arc of a scythe over a small, limp body... He suppressed a shiver. Grell’s usual cheer returned in a flash.  
  
“That’s right~” she purred. “So you don’t need to lock your windows against the Smiling Man, right~?” And with a light laugh, she was gone.  
  
He locked the window. He locked every window. Evidently, he had missed a few the first time around. Meirin found him later with his back pressed against the wall, trying in vain to stop his hands from shaking. She didn’t say a word, but a few minutes later he heard her on the phone, voice shaking, talking quickly about locks.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ha. So. Fluff decreasing rapidly. I promise we'll get back to cute things as soon as Sebastian and company deal with the Smiling Man. And all the assorted nonsense that comes with him.

_He woke to the smell of incense and a figure with onyx eyes watching, awaiting the best moment to move in for kill. No, that wasn’t right. It was watching, but it was watching like a well-fed cat watched a small animal, vaguely amused and considering being predatory. The demon couldn’t move from under that stare, pinned like a bird with a broken wing..._  
  
 _The entity with onyx eyes took a step towards him and smiled a smile that had too many teeth and didn’t fit at all, then raised a hand and spoke in a voice like taking an axe to a burning building, and the sound beat against his head hard enough to spill blood._  
  
\-----  
  
He woke to the smell of incense and a shadow falling over him, and for a split second was certain he was buried far underground, but then the world around him stabilized. He was curled on a chair in the kitchen, and Agni hurried over with something drinkable that smelled a little like tea but mostly like unfamiliar spices.  
  
“You are awake now, my friend?” Agni asked, looking concerned. “You had collapsed. Miss Meirin says you overwork yourself.”  
  
“Collapsed?” he echoed weakly. Demons didn’t faint, certainly. He recalled struggling with a window-bolt, which was also quite unbecoming a demon or a butler, and Meirin’s wide, startled eyes, but he did not recall collapsing.  
  
“You hit your head, I think,” said Agni, by means of explanation. Good enough. His head hurt, anyway. “We would have brought you to your room, but there was already someone there.”  
  
“Oh, yes.” He had nearly forgotten about Faust. Again. At least there seemed to be no questions forthcoming about the spiders, or the fact that Faust was on the bed with his boots on, or the black claws he had instead of fingernails. He was very glad that Agni wasn’t asking about that.  
  
“My friend...” He blinked and looked up from the mug of herbal whatever it was.  
  
“Yes?” the demon prompted. Agni hesitated, leaning on the back of a chair. He looked, if that was possible, even more worried than normal.  
  
“My friend, is there something I can help you with?” he asked, sitting down beside the demon and laying a hand on his arm. “You only need to say it.”  
  
It was a tempting proposition. A surprising forceful part of his mind wanted to lean into the gesture and talk about Faust, about the Smiling Man, about nightmares and dreams and contracts and everything, as though talking would make all of his troubles go away and confessing his sins would free him of them. He had to bite down on his tongue to stop himself.  
  
“No, there is nothing,” he said with a slight smile. Agni wasn’t a part of this mess. He was pure-hearted and good and dragging him into a world of demons would only do him harm. “Unless you could be bothered to help me with supper preparations. I seem to have fallen behind schedule again.”  
  
“Ah...” murmured Agni, and for a split second the demon could have sworn his expression was one of disappointment, but the next instant he was smiling warmly. “Certainly, then! Everything will go much faster working together.”  
  
\-----  
  
He was inordinately grateful for the company. Agni kept on not asking the very obvious questions and handled all of the knives and chattered pleasantly about nothing in particular and unlocked and opened the door for the unfamiliar young man delivering the Queen’s orders.  
  
“Is Mr. Ash not around?” asked the demon curiously. The strange young man seemed a lot quieter than Ash was, at least.  
  
“No, sir,” came the reply. “He has been ill recently. Poor man.”  
  
“Well, please convey our good wishes,” said Agni. The young man nodded.  
  
“Of course. If I see him, that is.” He hesitated. “No one has seen him in quite a while. Are you two friends of his?”  
  
“No,” said the demon quickly. Agni frowned.  
  
“Do you not know where he is?” he asked. The Queen’s messenger looked at his feet.  
  
“... No sir. He isn’t at his lodgings. Grey said–” But he stopped himself quickly. “I’m sure he will show up. It isn’t like Mr. Landers to do something like that. Good day to you both.” And with that, he practically ran for the door.  
  
“He was meeting with someone?” prompted Agni. The Queen’s messenger froze in the doorway.  
  
“It is probably nothing,” he said.  
  
“But?” prompted the demon. After another moment of agonizing over it, the Queen’s messenger dropped into one of the chairs. Agni helpfully supplied tea.  
  
“He had been meeting with a strange man,” the messenger explained, fidgeting slightly. “Everyone assumed that he belonged to some important group or another, but no one has seen him in a long time as well.”  
  
“Do you know what this stranger looks like?” the demon pressed, but got a resolutely negative response.  
  
“I never met him. Grey said he was a soldier of some sort, but he didn’t get a good look either.” A long pause. “A foreigner, he said. French, by the uniform.” The demon frowned and tried very hard not to think about Faust and his habit of not changing outfits between contracts.  
  
“There is something else bothering you?” said Agni, making it sound halfway between a question and a statement. The Queen’s messenger nodded unwillingly.  
  
“... It started earlier, didn’t it?” he said quietly. “Mr. Landers got worse recently, but it started earlier. It must have started even before they hired me. By the time I met him, he...” He let the idea drop. “You’ve met him. You know.”  
  
“Yes,” said Agni slowly. “We know.”  
  
“So that soldier could not have been to blame,” elaborated the Queen’s messenger. “Whatever was happening...”  
  
“Perhaps he was trying to help, then,” said Agni kindly, and the Queen’s messenger relaxed somewhat. The demon, however, did not.  
  
Perhaps he was trying to help. Perhaps they had eloped. Perhaps there was nothing important there at all. Perhaps Ash Landers had run off back to wherever he had come from. Perhaps he had family to tend to. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps, he had gone out after dark and met the Smiling Man... 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be honest, I am curious where you think this plot will go. I have it mostly planned out already, so everything seems blatantly obvious to me...


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there are reapers and serial killers again.

It didn’t get much better after that. Faust remained catatonic, and the spiders kept up a constant vigil. The demon still flinched at shadows. The young master started to wake up screaming at night, something he hadn’t done since the first year of the contract. At least there was an assignment to occupy their time, since a few too many people had turned up dead all of a sudden, killed with single blows to the heart. Another serial killer to stump Scotland Yard. At least this one left their intestines inside. Beyond that, though...  
  
“They have nothing in common, Sebastian,” grumbled his young master finally, throwing a stack of papers down on his desk. “It’s as though he’s picking them randomly.”  
  
“Sir?” prompted the demon curiously. True, he had not seen a pattern either, but that was no reason to talk of randomness with such disgust.  
  
“Humans aren’t random, though,” the boy continued. “There needs to be something I’m missing that links them all together. There has to be something.”  
  
“Surely,” said the demon. They had all been killed at night. That was hardly anything. Many killers struck at night, that did not make them boogeymen. Any human could wield a knife.  
  
“You aren’t helping, you know,” the boy huffed. The demon suppressed the pointless urge to roll his eyes and gave a little bow.  
  
“I know as much of this matter as you do. If you order me to retrieve some specific information, I will be of more use.” The boy threw up his hands in exasperation and sent papers fluttering all over the room.  
  
“Enough,” he snapped. “I need to get out of this house. Perhaps the will be something important to do with the corpses.”  
  
“Of course, Young Master,” replied the demon. He had a few of his own questions for Undertaker, not that he’d share those with his master. It had been enough trouble to keep him uninformed of the recent... troubles, after all. Were he to think the demon was anything less than infallible there would be no end to the fuss he would raise.  
  
\-----  
  
There was a vaguely familiar figure pacing in front of Undertaker’s shop. That reaper that had come to collect Grell before... Spears, that was his name. Passers-by didn’t seem to notice him. Neither did the young master, at least until the demon surreptitiously pointed him out.  
  
“The old man isn’t dead, is he?” the young master asked, instantly jumping to potentially the worst conclusion possible. Spears blinked and looked up from his ledger. It crossed the demon’s mind that he probably wasn’t used to being addressed directly.  
  
“Oh, it is the two of you,” he muttered, then snapped back to professionalism. “No, he is not dead. He is simply refusing to let anyone in.”  
  
“Well, we need to speak to him,” huffed the young master. “Sebastian, open that door.”  
  
“It will not work,” said Spears flatly. The demon ignored him, grabbed the door handle with both hands, and gave it a firm yank. The door retaliated by leaving him sprawled on the ground, still clutching the handle.  
  
“Sebastian,” growled his young master in the same tone he used for Soma nowadays. The corner of Spears’s mouth twitched slightly.  
  
“I told you it would not work,” he said. The demon glared at him, because glaring at the young master would be unbecoming.  
  
“Well, perhaps you can be of use, then,” said the young master abruptly. Spears eyed him curiously. Grell made that same face when she had to talk to humans too, though admittedly she made it rather more theatrically.  
  
“That really depends on what you intend to use me for, Ciel Phantomhive,” he replied. “But I have nowhere to be for the next three and a half minutes.” Good enough. He wondered if reapers had internal stopwatches.  
  
“The serial murders that have happened recently. If you lot have taken the souls of the victims, you know about how they died, right?” The young master could be pleasantly direct sometimes. He could also be passive-aggressive, manipulative, and utterly unaware of his own real goals, but sometimes he could be pleasantly direct. Spears turned a page in his ledger.  
  
“Single stab wound to the heart from in front. Weapon consistent. Force consistent. I cannot tell you more.” He clicked the ledger shut. The young master frowned.  
  
“I am certain you are unwilling to cut deals with demons, but all information has a price,” said the demon, deciding this was the correct time to intervene. “Name yours and I will supply it.” Spears exhaled. Perhaps a less stoic creature would have sighed.  
  
“I am unwilling to cut deals with demons,” he agreed. “So much so, that even if I had the information I would not bargain with you. As it is, it would be entirely out of line to demand payment for something I cannot offer.”  
  
“But the cinematic records–” the demon started. Spears tucked the ledger under his arm and turned away.  
  
“The cinematic records, as well as the souls, were missing. Good day to you both.” And he was gone in an almost imperceptible flash.  
  
“Well, he was just very helpful for someone who wasn’t helping us,” said the young master, looking rather confused. “Do you think this is another serial killing reaper?”  
  
“It’s plausible,” the demon replied. “At least, our target is with certainty something supernatural.” A human couldn’t remove a soul, but a demon certainly could. Though few demons would take this many souls at a time... A single strike to the heart. He could picture someone like Spears killing that way. Cold. Efficient. But then again, what use would a reaper have for a stockpile of souls? They just collected them and sent them on. He fought the urge to voice his frustration.  
  
“... All the more reason to deal with it quickly,” decided the young master.  
  
“Indeed,” said the demon, trying to sound idly disinterested. It was more of a chore than expected.  
  
\-----  
  
The townhouse smelled like food and whatever strange concoction Agni used to clean wooden things. Soma was going on and on about serial killers he had read about, because evidently the whole city had a few things to say about the recent deaths, and the young master decided that now was the time to sit and argue with him for over an hour. It struck the demon as a childish way to waste time, before he reminded himself that his young master was, in fact, a child. He had only turned thirteen that winter...  
  
“Something troubles you, my friend?” Agni asked from far closer than he should have been able to get without the demon noticing.  
  
“No, of course not,” said the demon quickly. He failed to assure even himself, though he couldn’t quite put words to that annoying stabbing sensation in his chest.  
  
“You work very hard to protect him,” said Agni quietly.  
  
“Of course I do,” replied the demon. “What kind of butler would I be if I didn’t?” Even though the contract would end in his young master’s death, even though his first order had been to kill, even though, even though...  
  
“I do not know. You would be a different Sebastian, then, I think.” It had been a rhetorical question, and that answer only served to twist that invisible knife further. It should have been a crime to be that trusting of a demon. Of anyone, really, but especially of a demon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sorry, this is going to be longer and take longer than anticipated. But, hey, murder!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry to not have updated this in forever, but my laptop broke down. Updates should be back on schedule now!

Child or not, his master wasn’t about to let the investigation drop. The demon ran himself ragged chasing shadows around London, turning up a few starved, scavenging minor demons and an ever-increasing pile of bodies, one of them still warm when he rounded the corner and found it, a hole in its chest and spilled flowers around it. In life, it had been a young girl. With her soft yellow hair, regardless of the grime she was found in, she reminded the demon painfully of Lady Elizabeth. He didn’t mention that one to his master. His master scrutinized china dolls and picked one in a ruffled pink gown and didn’t ask for details. He gave Lady Elizabeth the doll the next day when she came over for tea, and she was very much alive and shining and talking a mile a minute. The demon pretended not to see his master smiling, smiling as if he remembered how to be happy.  
  
The next morning, there were three more bodies found around the city. Abberline looked on helplessly as a child with scruffy, reddish hair was passed around the constables, recounting again and again the story of having found a corpse. The child’s voice was high, if a little hoarse, and when the young master interjected a question, the child turned and revealed a single, amber eye, the other or what was left of it hidden under a cloth patch. The young master stumbled on his words and had to restart his question twice, and got no answer until he offered food.  
  
\-----  
  
The girl, for it was a girl, with the eyepatch called herself Freckles. She laughed too much and seemed to have no fear of death. She had found a body, but what she hadn’t told the police was that she had seen the victim walk, then slow to a stop and turn and smile before the wound bloomed on his chest and he fell over dead. Of the killer, there had been no sign.  
  
“Completely invisible?” repeated the young master disbelievingly. Freckles nodded and swallowed a huge bite of sandwich.  
  
“You said it, posh-boy. ‘E was stabbed by something wasn’t there!” She chuckled. “Can’t tell the coppers that one, you know?”  
  
“I would imagine,” said the young master dryly. Freckles laughed again.  
  
“It’ll have ‘em thinking it was Red Jack, wouldn’t it? That one wasn’t nowhere either!” She looked serious again. “But it weren’t Red Jack,” she elaborated. “That one didn’t never make them smile.”  
  
\-----  
  
When Grell didn’t show up for a few days, he worried. When she did show her face, she was snappy and pale and lacking her usual smile. That settled it, then. The demon calmly passed one of the least expensive teacups to her through the window.  
  
“Do they suspect you?” he asked mildly. Grell growled.  
  
“Yes, those bastards. Will’s been being a darling, and I’m actually innocent this time, but–” She froze, then glared at him accusingly over her too-red spectacles. “I’m not supposed to tell you anything.”  
  
“Well, not telling me certain things is as good as telling me other ones,” said the demon. Grell frowned.  
  
“We have instructions from our superiors not to share details about this,” she muttered. “How much do you already know?” He told her. That won him a slight, sharp-toothed smile. “Alright, not much, then. Not that we know much more. Half the office says it’s demons, but...”  
  
“But it isn’t me, it isn’t Faust, and there isn’t anyone else here competent enough?” he finished. She nodded glumly.  
  
“I don’t much want to hunt angels, and I guess HQ doesn’t either, because they’re saying a reaper did it.” She grimaced. “So, of course, everyone’s looking at me like I have a uterus in my pocket or something. Which I don’t.”  
  
“Is this why Spears had you all monitoring me?” asked the demon suddenly. Grell blinked.  
  
“No... I don’t think so, anyway. It started up after that, anyway. Will wanted you monitored so that we’d know what you were doing, but...” But he wasn’t doing anything, and now there was something more dangerous about.  
  
“Do you think it was the Smiling Man?” he asked, half jokingly. Grell frowned into her tea.  
  
“Again with that? If it’s a reaper, it’s not the Smiling Man, is it? We don’t smile much, after all, except me, and I’m not a man.” The strange, faded memory had sharp teeth, didn’t it? Or was that false, painted on by later experiences. Reapers didn’t smile, but Grell did.  
  
“What would it take to make a reaper smile?” he asked. Grell laughed hollowly.  
  
“A day off, I guess. Or insanity. That’s the one I got, isn’t it?” She took a long drink. “Either way, we’d have to stop being ourselves for a little while. Off duty one way or another. Then we’d smile.”  
  
“I see,” said the demon, who really didn’t see at all.  
  
“No you don’t,” said Grell a little fondly. “But that’s okay. You don’t really need to. Thanks for the tea.”  
  
\-----  
  
They stepped up patrols in Whitechapel. The next few killings happened in West End. That evening, Freckles turned up on the doorstep of the townhouse, a determined look on her face. The demon heard her talking to Agni from the second floor and hurried down. Agni had, in typical Agni fashion, let her in and given her food and drink, and she cut off in the middle of a story at the sight of the demon.  
  
“An’ ‘e just fell over, he did– Is posh boy here?”  
  
“My master is presently otherwise occupied,” said the demon as formally as he could. “May I assist you, Miss Freckles?” The girl frowned.  
  
“I saw ‘im,” she blurted. “The guy who’s stabbing ‘em.”  
  
“I beg your pardon?”  
  
“T’ain’t Red Jack. I knew it. That one looked like a girl, Jackie did. This one’s bigger, an’ says sorry. I don’t think ‘e saw me see ‘im.” The explanation came in a tumbled rush. “I was walking back, but I saw ‘im in a glass. Great big gent with specs on, an’ ‘e had a knife in his hand an’ a great big sword-thing in t’other, and ‘e used both but only the knife hit blood, an’, an’ I turned round but weren’t no one there but I saw ‘im in the glass and I heard ‘im say sorry to the dead guy!”  
  
“A man with spectacles on?” prompted the demon, warily. Freckles nodded.  
  
“Ain’t seen ones like those, they was all dark so I couldn’t see ‘is face, and then his hair was weird too.” She gestured at her head. “It was half-all in braids. D’you know ‘im, Mr. Butler?”  
  
“No,” said the demon. “But I know who would.”  
  
“Red Jack, prolly,” said the girl with a giggle. “You think that sort all drinks together?” Agni reappeared, armed with emergency samosas. The girl looked positively starstruck. “Smells gooooood...”  
  
“I am glad to hear that!” said Agni, as if he hadn’t probably just heard the tail end of Freckles’s ramble about murderers. The girl cheerfully shoved two samosas into her mouth at once, and the demon had to physically stop himself from wincing. Agni looked vaguely amused, because he cared less about table manners and more about people enjoying food. After a moment her face fell.  
  
“Hey, can I ask somethin’?” she asked. The demon briefly considered refusing.  
  
“Of course,” said Agni warmly. “What is bothering you, Miss?” Other than murder and the supernatural, presumably?  
  
“... ‘E really did look sorry. Why’d he kill people if he was sorry ‘bout it?” The question hung in the air. The demon shrugged.  
  
“Perhaps he was simply a good actor,” he said. “Or perhaps he was following orders.” Agni frowned.  
  
“... It could be, maybe, that he thought he was doing someone a kindness,” he said slowly. Freckles stared at him.  
  
“By killin’ ‘em, you mean?” she asked dubiously. Agni slowly rewound bandages around his thumb.  
  
“Do you have family, Miss?” he asked finally. The girl nodded. “Then, if your family was in trouble, and you heard that... you heard that you could fix it, take away all of their troubles, but you would need to do something wicked. If that was so, would you do it?”  
  
“For big bro and big sis...?” she mused, looking thoughtful. “... Yeah. I think they’d do it too.”  
  
“Then this man may be doing that as well,” said Agni. Freckles’s eyes widened in understanding.  
  
“Oh! I didn’t even...” She paused. “Bloke was invisible though. D’you think people like that has family?”  
  
“Why would he not?” asked Agni. “Even a demon can have people close to him.” The demon did his best not to flinch, but his concern was baseless. “There is a story, I have heard–”  
  
“I love stories!” said Freckles, lighting up as if Christmas had come early, as the idiom went. She would be properly distracted, then. The demon made himself scarce and set about his work once again.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry for vanishing. I legit broke my wrist. If anyone is still reading this, here's an update.

The next morning, there were four more corpses found around London, and the demon banged furiously on Undertaker’s closed, locked door. It was a futile effort. The man apparently still wasn’t taking visitors. The young reaper with the two-tone hair caught him there.  
  
“You need to stay away, Sebby,” the boy said seriously. He had bags under his eyes, and the demon wondered if reapers needed to sleep. “Sorry, but it’s rules.”  
  
“There were no rules about it before,” the demon grumbled. The reaper boy– Knox? – pulled a face.  
  
“Upstairs says you’re not supposed to be involved. No demons now. It’s all our jurisdiction, see?” He sighed. “Mind, you’re the one who caught Grell that one time, so I don’t see why. Boss said...”  
  
“What did he say?” Spears had been useful the previous time, at least. Knox winced.  
  
“Boss said to gather intel, no matter the source, but that may be because people are blaming us now...” He could not picture Spears being guilty of anything, simply by virtue to being entirely too boring to consider breaking a rule.  
  
“Because a reaper is to blame?” the demon prompted. Knox nodded. “I could give you a description,” he added. For a price, of course. Knox fidgeted.  
  
“You saw him?”  
  
“No,” replied the demon honestly. “Someone else did.” He saw Knox weigh his options and come to a hasty decision.  
  
“They’re blaming Ms Grell, you know. I’ll trade information with you if you want. You must have come here for something, right?” His eyes were rather desperately hopeful, bright green and wide, and for a split second the demon could imagine why Agni had willingly let him pass time in the kitchen. Then the second passed, and he felt rather blank.  
  
“Do you know of something called the Smiling Man?” he blurted instead, even though no one else had heard of it. Him. That. Knox blinked and adjusted his glasses.  
  
“The... Smiling Man...?” he echoed cautiously. “Reapers aren’t supposed to know much about smiling, you know.” The demon nodded shortly. As expected. Knox bit his lip. “All I can think is a story...” Grell had called it a storybook title as well. The demon nodded again, and tried to look encouraging. “It’s... stupid, really. The sort of thing they tell little kids, you know? But it was written, anyway. The story goes, once upon a time I guess, there were two... There was a reaper, first, and he was wanted vengeance, or so they say. In seeking vengeance, he met a paragon of justice– a woman, she called herself Nemesis– and they pursued the wicked with a cold blade and a burning smile...” He shrugged. “I guess Nemesis’s partner would be a Smiling Man, right? But probably not a THE Smiling Man, huh?”  
  
“Was he mad?” asked the demon. Knox looked at him askance. “The reaper in the story. Was he mad?”  
  
“Reckon so,” replied Knox slowly. “It was a long time ago, but... No one ever says what he wanted revenge for...” That was better than nothing and twisted memories.  
  
“Your killer is a reaper with a scythe that looks like a sword, dark spectacles, and his hair in braids,” he answered, and to his surprise Knox went white as a sheet. “He apologizes when he kills them, I’m told.” Knox’s eyes looked too bright against his skin.  
  
“That’s... that’s not possible...” he whimpered. “He would never– not– impossible...”  
  
“That is who was seen,” said the demon bluntly. “Not Grell, so you should be glad. Pleasure doing business with you.” And he turned and stalked away, leaving the young reaper shaken and pale against the wall. He got approximately ten feet before he looked back. “I’m sure Spears will know what to do.”  
  
“He’ll know you’re lying, demon,” Knox spat hoarsely. The demon ignored the invisible knife in his chest again. It had started to be a constant sensation.  
  
\--------  
  
Grell nearly took a window out with that accursed chainsaw two days later, fake lashes askew and freckles standing out in sharp relief. Her eyes were too green too. The demon lunged to open the window before it could be destroyed.  
  
“You,” she spat. The demon bowed a little.  
  
“Hello Grell,” he muttered. The chainsaw stopped a millimeter from his nose, and Grell growled at him.  
  
“It’s your fault,” she blurted. “I mean it’s not, but it is, and he’s in medical!” Then she apparently realized that the demon had no context for that statement and sighed heavily. “Alan. Alan is in medical because he had an attack because Internal Affairs came for Eric because Will gave West the tip you gave Ronnie but Eric’s gone but he left a confession and it’s all your fault.”  
  
“If he confessed to it,” the demon began, but Grell waved a hand, luckily not the one holding the chainsaw.  
  
“That’s not it! Eric’s not that kind of guy– if he did this, he had to have had a reason. A real one.” Grell frowned. “He’s not like me, you see. He cares. About people, about things... He cares too much, even. It’s bad form. He wouldn’t just hurt people without a reason.”  
  
“He’d do it to protect someone, perhaps?” offered the demon, thinking about Agni and about Freckles’s story, and his brain called up images of a figure kneeing by a sickbed. Grell looked away uncomfortably.  
  
“This guy...” she muttered. “But I still don’t know why he thought that would work. Or what he did with the souls, for that matter. Will’s still in trouble for that.”  
  
“And the old man still won’t talk to anyone?” the demon finished. Grell nodded lamely.  
  
“I have no idea why...” she repeated glumly. “I genuinely don’t know. His note said it was for everyone’s good, but I don’t think there’s any greater good that comes from killing people, is there? Except in old stories and stuff, I guess, but Eric’s hardly a knight in shining armor, and those people were... were innocent, right?”  
  
“I am hardly the right person to ask about innocence,” replied the demon mildly, thinking of the little girl with the blonde curls who had been left in the gutter.  
  
“It’s unjust,” mumbled Grell. “We are supposed to be just and fair in our judgements, and this isn’t.”  
  
“Maybe Nemesis would know,” offered the demon, and Grell laughed hollowly.  
  
“Nemesis? From the stories?” she asked. “He killed her, you know. Her partner did. Painted her up in red and left her in the Black Forest with a hole in her chest.”  
  
“And walked away with a cold blade and a burning smile?” finished the demon. Grell chuckled again.  
  
“Sure, there’s your Smiling Man, I suppose.” She grinned with too many teeth and sad eyes. “Hope Eric doesn’t run into him, wherever he is.”  
  
\-------  
  
He didn’t really believe in justice. It would be foolish for a demon to believe in such things, in the end. He locked all the windows and didn’t think about Germany, didn’t think about forests, didn’t think of the arc of a bloodstained scythe or of a smile like a burning building, and didn’t think of a woman with a bloodstain on her pink dress and black gloves on her hands, and then certainly did not think of how he could not remember her face.  
  
\------  
  
It was familiar, by now, that his master screamed in the night. When the terrified shriek came from the servants’ quarters, the demon was briefly flummoxed before rushing to the rescue. A window latch had been opened, and Finny was desperately struggling with a hooded figure who kept flickering between types of visibility. The demon threw a plate at his head, and the hooded man crumbled, revealing dark spectacles and half a head of braids. He lurched unsteadily back to his feet, then shakily pointed his scythe – a saw, not a sword – at the demon.  
  
“I’m sorry,” he rasped. “Just a few– he said I just need a few more.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear I am still trying to write this fic! Only school. And my wrist. And attempts at actual real life novels. I really can't write fight scenes.

The reaper facing him looked sick, and a smell of decay and ink clung to him. Ink? That was... odd, wasn’t it? They did not normally smell like that. Grell stank of perfume, certainly, and the boy Knox had smelled of strawberries and cream when he had been in the kitchen, but then...  
  
“Get out of my house,” spat the demon, deciding to do first things first. Whether or not reapers could normally smell like ink or strawberries or anything at all could be dealt with later. Finny scrambled to his feet and hid behind the demon, shaking and sniffling. The reaper opened his mouth, then closed it again and shook his head. His glasses were askew.  
  
“I need it,” he repeated. “Please– death is gentle. I– it will not hurt if you do not– do not struggle.” Finny clutched onto the demon’s tailcoat and buried his face in the demon’s back. Ink did not leave a smell hanging in the air like that, not normally.  
  
“Death is gentle, is it?” growled the demon. “You will know it well if you do not leave immediately.”  
  
“I can’t,” the reaper pleaded hoarsely. Eric. Knox and Grell had called him Eric. “I need– we need–” He lurched forward unsteadily forward and swung his scythe with surprising force and speed. The demon barely caught it in time, and very nearly stumbled.  
  
“Eric.” Making eye contact and speaking gently worked to calm humans and Grell. Maybe the same thing would apply here. “Eric, who is making you do this?” The reaper wobbled on his feet.  
  
“How do you know my name?”  
  
“Your coworkers are worried about you,” the demon pressed. Ought he have referred to them as friends instead? “Killing people like this is not like you, is it?” Grell had said he cared too much. “For whom do you do this?”  
  
“He’ll die if I don’t,” Eric muttered. “It is only a few more. He said...” Something flashed in Eric’s eyes, a split second of black overwhelming green, and he lurched forward again. “It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter. I just need a thousand. It doesn’t matter.” Bard was in the doorway with a gun, eying the half-hysterical reaper warily. A kitten was peering around his legs. The demon wondered distantly where the other three were.  
  
“Eric.” Repeating his name made him slow down, at least. That was helpful. “Eric, you need to go back. One of– Grell said one of your coworkers is in medical now that you ran away.” That elicited a reaction. “Alan, I think. He’s only getting worse like this.” That was a lie, of course. He had no idea what state Grell’s assorted colleagues were in, now or ever, but at least Eric looked sufficiently conflicted all of a sudden. The scythe dropped back to his side.  
  
“That’s why I need to do this,” Eric managed after a moment. “It’s been fixed before. He said it’d been fixed before.”  
  
“Who said so?” asked the demon for what felt like the thousandth time, and this time something strange happened. The reaper opened his mouth to argue or respond but only a raspy, choked sound emerged. His eyes went wide with terror and the scythe dropped from his fingers and buried in the floor with a dull thunk. A dim glow spread from his chest, flickering in the dim light, and his body began to shake. One of the kittens gave a low, unhappy yowl and fled under a bed.  
  
“Oi, is he having some kinda seizure?” asked Bard, lowering his gun somewhat. He looked concerned. “What’s going on?” The demon was not entirely sure how to answer that. Whatever was glowing was moving somewhat, and there was a darker stain spreading on the reaper’s dark coat. Blood? It did not smell like blood. It smelled like ink–  
  
“Finny, please let go of me for a moment.” Finny obeyed and bolted for the door instead. Good enough. The demon lunged for the saw-scythe and swung, narrowly avoiding slicing Eric’s chest as well as the rippling, stained glowing thing, which flew apart in pieces. A record, he realized. A record stained with ink. It reformed and coiled around the scythe instead, and he gladly let that drop to the ground beside its owner.  
  
“What,” said Bard. No further words were forthcoming and the gun was pointed in the demon’s general direction now. Eric lay on the ground, breathing shallowly but otherwise still. That meant he was conscious, the demon supposed. Grell had told him reapers had no need to breathe. Cautiously, the demon knelt beside him with half and intention of checking for a pulse, but one of Eric’s gloved hands closed sharply around his wrist.  
  
“Yes?” prompted the demon as politely as he could. The reaper’s blank green eyes fixed on a point over his shoulder.  
  
“He was here,” Eric rasped. “He was here and he took payment.” It was a little too familiar. “The Smiling Man took them to pay.” And then the grip on his wrist slackened and Eric went completely still.  
  
\---------  
  
There was no point in hiding this one. He was bundled onto a spare bed in a spare room and not even spiders went to keep him company, while Finny cried and Meirin tried to comfort him and Bard paced back and forth and Snake took up residence in a wardrobe. The demon leaned his head against the cool window and contemplated praying, though he was not entirely sure how to go about something like that. Closing his eyes only made him see stranger things – blood and ink on a pink dress, a smile like a burning building, Faust in blindingly green grass, an idol with onyx eyes – so he stared out into the garden instead. He would have to clean up the ink stains. Those had stayed in the carpet and were real enough for Meirin to comment warily about them. The ones on his gloves, maybe, were less real. No one had commented, at least. It still smelled like rot, somewhere behind everything else, and his kittens were under Finny’s bed and refused to come back out. Some part of his mind wanted to call Agni. Another part wondered how best to summon Grell. He tried to ignore both.  
  
“Sebastian.” It took him far too long to process that he was being addressed. Tanaka was standing a respectable distance behind him. Apparently the old man was awake now.  
  
“Yes?” Occasionally Tanaka dropped pearls of wisdom. Occasionally he woke only to drink tea, but occasionally there was wisdom. The demon forced a smile in his general direction, and Tanaka moved to stand beside him at the window.  
  
“It is chaotic, is it not?” he asked. The demon nodded. “This is the sort of thing that occurs when order is destroyed, so of course it is frightening.” Was he frightened? He considered considering it, but he was too tired. How long had he been tired? It felt like he had been tired for longer than he had been hungry.  
  
“Of course,” he replied instead. Tanaka looked at him askance.  
  
“So, what do you propose to do?” he asked. The demon laughed weakly.  
  
“Consult with Nemesis, perhaps?” he offered wearily. Finding a dead fictional woman was as workable a solution as any, he supposed. To his surprise, Tanaka nodded as though it made perfect sense.  
  
“Yes,” he mused. “A vacation in the countryside may do us all a world of good. And you have, after all, solved this case already.” He smiled. “And they have lovely tea at Saint Mary’s.” And before the demon could open his mouth, Tanaka shrank back down and dropped into a nearby chair to doze.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who's back! After like, a year. Oops. If anyone's still reading/following this, here's a new chapter! Wherein there is a change in scenery, and our heroes(?) meet a somewhat helpful stranger.

The town of Saint Mary’s-on-the-River was the sort of place where even a shout felt muted by the softness of the atmosphere. The trees were still green and full-leafed, and the scent of lilacs drifted in the wind. The demon frowned. It was not the right time of the season for lilacs, nor was he in the right state of mind for calming scents and muted sounds, and even less so for distant church bells tolling the hour. Still, a lead was a lead, and a rather ridiculous amount of pushing and prodding had revealed this particular Saint Mary’s as the most likely dwelling of the mysterious Nemesis.  
  
“Look! Ciel!” Prince Soma dangled out the half-open carriage door, yelling and pointing. “I saw a fox! Look!”  
  
“Ought we hunt it?” The young master’s voice was cool. “That’s what we English do, you know.”  
  
“That is too cruel!” Prince Soma yelped.  
  
“Did you know,” said the demon, very glad for a distraction, “that in some countries there are legends about foxes that can turn into beautiful women?”  
  
“Oh, yeah. Agni knows stories like that, right?” Prince Soma replied cheerily. “They’re … Japanese?”  
  
“Among other countries,” said Agni. “Not, I think, English, though.”  
  
“Far Eastern, anyway,” said the demon with a shrug. “So perhaps young men ought not go chasing foxes.” His knowledge of those stories was vague and filtered through the servants and Tanaka’s half-asleep recitations, but the fox-women were cruel, vindictive, vicious, and generally not the sort of creature he wanted to deal with. If Nemesis existed, if Nemesis was alive, he wanted to find her, get what information he needed, and leave as soon as was possible.  
  
“The fox is following us,” Prince Soma announced a few moments later. He was now actually leaning out of the carriage to watch it. Not for the first time, the demon wished he would fall, or at least that he could have stayed behind, but Agni had somehow managed to get both of them invited along to investigate. The demon and his master quietly blamed one another for the misstep, but there was nothing they could do about it at this point.  
  
“The fox is not following us,” said the demon’s master flatly.  
  
“Oi, I see the fox!” Bard yelled from the second carriage excitedly. “It’s right there!”  
  
“Ooh!” Meirin’s exclamation of excitement followed a moment later. “I see it, I do! What a pretty foxy!” The demon rolled his eyes skyward and thought that this was the sort of situation where humans prayed for patience.  
  
——————  
  
Perhaps it was because he was more used to cities, or perhaps it was because he was still trying to stop his hands from shaking, or perhaps it had something to do with the mind-numbing lilac-scented haze he was currently drifting in, but the demon could not make heads or tails of the streets. He was sure they had gone up and down the same be-wisteria’d lane at least four times, though he wasn't sure anyone else was aware of the fact. Everyone except Agni looked a bit dazed, and he was only discounting Agni because Agni always looked a but dazed. It took the demon a good ten seconds to figure out that someone had emerged from one of the other lanes and was watching them.  
  
“Hello?” the demon offered uncertainly.  
  
“Hello, strangers.” Was this the first person he had seen in this town? Surely not, but she was the first one to draw attention. He blinked. Yes, this was certainly the type of girl that drew attention: tall and willowy, with snow-white skin and black hair shorn into a bob around her chin, warm, shining eyes that caught people and pulled them in and a ruby-lipped smile with sharp fangs–  
  
The demon took a sharp step back, startled, a much-belated warning ringing in his head. The fanged smile widened, and before he could utter any sort of warning Agni took two steps forward around him and smiled back at the girl-demon with his usual gentle manner.  
  
“Namaste, Miss!” he called, offering her a deep bow. The girl-demon blinked, and the fanged grin faded into something slightly more genuine.  
  
“Namaste!” she chirped back. “I can’t imagine you know your way around here, do you?”  
  
“No,” admitted Agni with a vague gesture. “I am afraid we are quite lost. Is the ah… the White Goat Inn somewhere this way?”  
  
“Down this street and turn left when you find the gigantic oak tree,” sad the girl-demon promptly. “Um.” She frowned suddenly and looked him up and down. “Wait.”  
  
“Yes?” Agni prompted, smiling broadly. Her spell was broken, and now she looked a good deal more like a girl of barely twenty and a good deal more like a demon as well, her big eyes wary and slit-pupiled as she stared at him. Agni either didn’t notice or didn’t think it worth commenting upon.  
  
“Well, you are strangers, aren’t you?” she managed finally. “Won’t you tell me your names, so I can feed something into the local rumor mill? Though honestly, I would imagine Auntie knows all about you by now.” She pulled a face.  
  
“I am called Agni,” said Agni, who seemed to have become a metaphorical brick wall as well as, in some cases, an almost-literal one. “Who might you be?”  
  
“I’m called Roxanne,” she replied, leaning entirely too close to him in a way that set the demon’s teeth on edge. “Roxanne King. Nice to meet you, Mr. Agni– and friends!” She winked generally at them and blew a kiss at Prince Soma, who turned nearly purple. Agni frowned.  
  
“He is sixteen,” he said sternly. Roxanne King’s face fell, neat brows drawing together on her snow white forehead. The expression looked familiar in a dizzying, confusing way for a moment before he pegged it as a Grell expression, which didn’t make him any more comfortable. Then she shrugged.  
  
“Oh well! I’ll just pay attention to you, instead! Since you aren’t a child, about to run away, or about to shoot me.” She glared at Bard. “Really, that’s no way to treat a lady!”  
  
“If you creep out Mr. Sebastian, you’re no lady,” announced Bard in an unexpected show of… probably loyalty.  
  
“Ooh!” said Roxanne King. “Two whole names out of this party! Thank you kindly!”  
  
“You are most welcome,” said Agni politely. “Might you give us another name, in turn?” Roxanne King looked dubious, but nodded.  
  
“Sure, why not? For names like those, I’ll give you mine and my aunt’s. She’s called Jane August– if you’ll be here more than a day, you’ll meet her, I’m sure of it. The likes of you would notice her too!” And with a light laugh that was somehow very like the the ringing of silver bells and the yipping of a fox, she was gone.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear this is going somewhere. Really. For those still reading this mess: enjoy.

The air seemed clearer on the other side of having checked into the inn. Definitely supernatural, then, thought the demon resignedly, though whether Nemesis or the girl-demon Roxanne was to blame he was not sure. Prince Soma flirted atrociously with any girl who looked twice at him as well as with the innkeeper’s son, and within half an hour of checking in he, as well as all of his companions were directed to the nearest church. That was probably a matter of cause and effect. The young master seemed amused by this turn of events, at least.  
  
The church was an old building, but it was built on something older still, something that had been holy before London had been London and before England had been England, the sort of ancient thing that drew its power from its age. The demon stopped short at the edge of the church grounds and refused to go any further on principle alone. His young master threatened to order him to get some holy water, Prince Soma got distracted by pretty windows, and Agni started talking very loudly and earnestly about the purifying powers of the Ganges River and would not shut up until a vaguely baffled-looking young priest emerged and greeted them.  
  
“Good morning!” Prince Soma shouted back cheerfully. The priest seemed to think deeply about something, then made a decision.  
  
“If you’re looking for Father Greyson, you’ve missed him by about a week,” he said. “Sorry.”  
  
“We aren’t,” replied the young master. “I don’t know who Father Greyson is.” The priest, if possible, looked even more baffled.  
  
“Oh,” he said. “Usually anyone odd coming by here is looking for him. This used to be his parish, you see– well, you don’t see, if you don’t know him, do you?” He wrung his hands uncomfortably. “I… Are you here to see the church, then? It is a marvel of antiquity, to be certain. I have no idea how Father Greyson kept it in such good shape…”  
  
“Father Greyson left in a hurry, then?” the young master pressed. The young priest was certainly human, but any number of creatures had passed themselves off as men of the cloth. Or nuns. That had always had interesting results. The point was, humans rarely questioned the motives of those in power, so a mysteriously vanishing priest was worth being slightly concerned over.  
  
“No…” the human priest hesitated. “That is, everything was set up properly for him to get a replacement– that is, for me to come here– but he… I suppose there are things one does, when leaving, aren’t there? He was there to welcome me to town and then the next hour he was gone, but it wasn’t… it wasn’t in a strange way. No one seemed surprised.” He winced. “Well, aside from her, of course.”  
  
“Her?” This time the demon decided to intervene.  
  
“Miss King,” said the priest, in the same vaguely uncomfortable way the demon and some others said Grell Sutcliffe. “She, ah, she came looking for him the morning after he left, almost had a fit. Her aunt came to collect her, said it was all a big misunderstanding, but, well, if you’ve met the girl…”  
  
“Yes,” said the young master. “I understand entirely.” The priest nodded vehemently and made a meaningless gesture. Apparently Miss King was infamous. The demon’s mind flickered briefly back to the image of her in street, the air thick with the smell of flowers in full bloom and he amended his mental phrasing. Miss King was appropriately infamous.  
  
“Do you know what she may have wanted with Father Greyson?” the demon asked. “She hardly seemed to be the… faithful sort.” The young priest gestured again. It was possibly supposed to be a shrug, though he would not bet much on it.  
  
“No…” he admitted. Agni took two paces forward to step within the church grounds and clasped his hands together loudly enough to make the young priest jump.  
  
“But Miss King’s aunt, Miss August, she is the sort of person who would associate with Father Greyson, yes?” he suggested. “What the English call, maybe, a maiden aunt?”  
  
“Well, yes,” the priest admitted. “She was a dear friend of his, true, but she is not the one who made the fuss.” He paused. “Actually, I am almost entirely certain she would know where he is. She was the only one who didn’t seem shocked he was gone.”  
  
————  
  
While finding the right Saint Mary’s had been a great deal of trouble, everyone in the town seemed incredibly helpful. That was why within half an hour the demon found himself facing down Miss King once again, this time in the garden of impeccably neat little cottage where everyone insisted she and Jane August lived. Aside from the girl and an old tabby cat asleep in the window, it seemed presently unoccupied, however.  
  
“Dear me, you actually showed up!” Roxanne King purred, leaning over the gate, red lips parted and scent and spell turning the air nearly liquid. “Didn’t get lost this time, my dears?”  
  
“It is a bit easier when one knows what one is looking for,” snapped the demon. He had never really wished for backup before, but at that point he really did want to be able to throw Faust at the girl and flee. Or throw a reaper at her. Regardless, there were no reapers to be found and Faust was still, as far as he knew, catatonic on his bed in the manor. It was probably for the best that he had sent the other servants off to scout the area as well; Bard possibly would have shot the girl where she stood. Tanaka could have been useful, but Tanaka had fallen asleep in the inn and could not be moved come Hell or high water.  
  
“And what are you looking for, exactly?” she asked, her smile widening. “Please, tell me. I may be able to give it to you.” The young master was swaying on his feet, a kerchief held up to cover his mouth and nose. It couldn't have been quite so magical a scent if it could aggravate his asthma. The demon was almost relieved.  
  
“I can’t see how it is your business,” he replied coldly. Roxanne King pouted at him.  
  
“Please,” said Agni abruptly. “There has been a great deal of trouble, and I think we need to talk to your aunt.” The girl raised her eyebrows. “Please. We are looking for someone only she may know of. Yes?” He glanced towards the demon quickly for confirmation. He nodded, because there was little else he could do. Agni either knew exactly everything or was bluffing off of their attempt to find the missing priest.  
  
“Auntie Jane knows a lot of people,” said Roxanne King with a shrug. “I’ll need a name. She is an elderly lady, you know.” The young master started upon a coughing fit and nearly fell over. Prince Soma caught him before the demon could, then almost dropped him again upon realizing the demon was looming over them both. Roxanne King clicked her tongue in annoyance. “Oh, are we going to just stand around like this or will you spit it out?” she snapped finally.  
  
“My dear,” said a soothing voice from inside the cottage. “They are more likely to tell you what they want when that boy can breathe again. Won’t you let them inside? The flowers can be a little overwhelming, can’t they?”  
  
“Quite,” said the demon through gritted teeth.  
  
“They smell very nice,” said Agni politely at almost the same time. Roxanne King shrugged dramatically and stepped out of the way.  
  
“Fine, fine. Whatever you say, auntie,” she said with a sigh. “Come in, then, and try not to drop the watch-pup.”  
  
————  
  
Jane August, sitting in a rocking chair with a half-knitted, fluffy pink scarf on her lap, looked like a perfectly ordinary old woman. She had silver hair, pulled into a bun at the base of her neck, and clear, intelligent blue eyes set in a worn and wrinkled but not unpleasant face. In fact, it took the demon a good few glances to register the only point about her that did not appear perfectly ordinary: the black, lace-trimmed gloves that covered her hands. Still, the discrepancy was minimal. Anyone who didn’t know better would certainly assume her to be exactly as she portrayed herself. Most of her visitors certainly didn’t know better.  
  
Truth be told, even though he knew better, the demon did not think about knowing better until he had made quite sure his young master was breathing evenly, and Prince Soma was confined to a very comfortable couch, and he had secured tea and biscuits, and Agni had stalled Roxanne King well enough so that the air was clear. Then he handed the old woman a cup of tea, looked into her eyes, and lost both his original train of thought and the ability to speak.  
  
He knew her.  
  
He had known her.  
  
————  
  
_Faust whimpered behind him like a kicked dog, and the young demon called Messer dug his claws into the palms of his hands to stop himself from similarly vocalizing the fear and disgust building within him. Demons were not naturally averse to blood, but to see the whole clearing stained with it turned his stomach. There were bodies, but only the scent let him know they had once been human._  
  
_“You ought not be here,” said a soft, soothing voice. It still made him jump. “This is a sorry sight, especially for such little things as you.”_  
  
_“I am not little,” he blurted out, for lack of anything else to say. He was certainly littler than the speaker, who was tall and deathly pale– a demon that walked the mortal world for longer than he had existed. She smiled gently, lifting the hem of her long skirt so that she could crouch without staining it. When most demons smiled it was all teeth and hunger, more a snarl than anything else, but her smile was warm, soft– there was nothing vicious in her clear blue eyes, no anger, no deception._  
  
_“Surely not. Perhaps I am concerned for your brother, hm?” As she spoke, she reached out to tousle Faust’s curls, and he leaned into the gesture fondly. Messer frowned, but didn’t correct her. Brother was not an entirely wrong word to use, he thought. It wasn’t right, but it wasn’t wrong. The blue-eyed demon drew back her hand._  
  
_“Did you do this to them?” Messer asked suddenly. Usually a creature that sowed such carnage would come away stained with blood, but maybe she had changed her dress. He certainly would have. There was no point in going around covered in blood and smelling bad. Something he could not quite interpret yet flickered across the demon-woman’s face._  
  
_“No,” she said quietly. “My… Someone else did.”_  
  
_“Are you lying?” Messer pressed. “It’s… demonic.” That was supposed to be a good thing, but as soon as it came out of his mouth he knew it didn’t sound like a good thing, not even to him. The blue-eyed demon shook her head._  
  
_“I don’t tell lies,” she said. “And a proper demon shouldn’t.”_  
  
—————  
  
_Her dress was a dull, dusty shade of pink that, centuries later, the demon who wasn’t Messer anymore would be able to put a name to. At that point, the color stuck in his mind’s eye, marred by the bloodstain spreading slowly across her chest as she hung from the tree like some strange scarecrow, bound by her arms, an offering to the carrion birds that were Messer’s real kin. Her smile had been warm and her eyes had been clear, but now her face was drawn and contorted with pain, and light was fading from her eyes. It took a lot to kill a demon, but whoever had attacked her may have actually succeeded._  
  
_Before he could think the action through, Messer had clambered up the tree, tearing at the ropes that held her. Ropes? Not ropes. Something that shone and twisted in his hands– it didn’t tear, but one end came loose and he managed to lower her to the ground._  
  
_“Miss– I– What happened?” That was the best question to ask, probably. The blue-eyed demon blinked slowly and tried to collect herself._  
  
_“I was wrong,” she murmured. “I saw all the facts and I drew the wrong conclusion. About him– about everything.” She drew a shaky breath. “Child, this time you must heed me. Flee. Find your brother and flee. There is only one path he can take from here.”_  
  
—————  
  
“Nemesis,” he said. He had meant it as a question but it was not a question, because there was nothing to question. The blue-eyed demon smiled, and her smile was warm and her eyes were clear. "You– you are Nemesis."  
  
“I should suppose,” she said quietly, “that you no longer are called Messer, my dear.”


	10. Chapter 10

“Who the Hell,” said the young master coldly, “is Nemesis?” The blue-eyed demon laughed softly and turned her gaze to her knitting again. Roxanne King leaned gently against her aunt’s rocking chair, her eyes shining.  
  
“That is quite a story, I’d say,” the girl purred. “I don’t even know all the juicy bits!”  
  
“It really is quite simple, truly,” the blue-eyed demon murmured. “There is nothing grand to tell, child. No one else was Nemesis, you see, so I had to be. There was so much– there is still so very much that happens that oughtn’t happen, you see, so very many things that should have been stopped, but there is no one who goes out and stops them, and that has always been the case.” She paused to look at them again. “Of course, that’s not all of it– all of Nemesis,” she added vaguely.  
  
“You did not answer the question,” the young master grumbled.  
  
“Oh,” she said. “I suppose it wouldn’t look like it, would it?” With a sigh, she set her knitting down again. “I am Nemesis, but I am not Nemesis now, not anymore, because, you see, she died.”  
  
“But you did not die,” the demon blurted. “You’re alive.” An eternity later, centuries later, she was alive. She nodded slowly.  
  
“Yes, my dear, I am alive. It is– in some sense, it is quite troubling.” The young master looked like he was about to throw his tea at someone. Prince Soma looked baffled. Agni was watching her closely.  
  
“Not only that you live?” he asked suddenly. “The troubling– that which troubles you?”  
  
“Quite so,” said Nemesis. “But what has brought you all to my parlor? You did not come to hear me prattle.” There were any number of ways to answer that question. Roxanne King pouted.  
  
“They wouldn't tell me either, Auntie,” she said.  
  
“A serial killer,” said the young master slowly. “Sebastian said you would know something about his motives.”  
  
“A serial killer?” Roxanne King echoed, a rather un-demonic look of disgust on her pretty face. “Why would Auntie know anything about that?”  
  
“You would be surprised, my dear, how much any given person may know about a given topic,” said Nemesis with a sad smile. “Has your serial killer told you anything? I will help however I can.”  
  
The demon promptly recounted the story. It had sounded less complex in his head– less rambling, too, though he found himself talking in circles about Faust and avoiding talking about nightmares. It kept coming back to Faust, somehow, by way of reapers and Jack the Ripper, and Eric and his collection of souls, and Ash who had vanished without a trace and windows that would not stay locked. Nemesis nodded at all the appropriate moments. Roxanne King wolf-whistled at revelations. He tried not to look at Agni or Prince Soma. He did not want to know what they thought of the whole mess– what Agni would– He didn’t know how to finish that statement, but he was very sure he did not want something that was probably happening to happen, anyway.  
  
“Oh,” said Nemesis once he was done. “I see.” She said that in much the same way a proper lady would respond to the news that a rail line had been extended, or some such similar thing.  
  
“So perhaps you could tell us something concrete about the Smiling Man?” the demon finished lamely. “Please?”  
  
“He is in London, isn’t he?” said Nemesis mildly. “The Smiling Man, I mean. I suppose he would wander over there, he’s the sort of person who likes big cities. They’re exciting, supposedly.”  
  
“They are, though,” said Roxanne King. “There is so much to see– people, places…!” Nemesis smiled wanly.  
  
“I am sure of it,” she said. “Yes, there are always people there. The Smiling Man is surely in London, looking for interesting things. I imagine… well, I imagine you know him. You are surely interesting enough.” Her clear blue eyes passed over them again. “A fascinating soul is like a beacon, but then you must know that.”  
  
“You think the Smiling Man is collecting souls?” the young master asked sharply.  
  
“Well, in a manner of speaking,” said Nemesis. “There are a great many ways to collect something, whether you need a thousand and one of something or just one, I would say. That matters less– that matters little, in the end. He is the sort of person who is always there, watching, pushing things along– a little like checkers, or chess, isn’t it? I imagine you know a great deal about games like that, little king.” She paused again, staring at the young master thoughtfully. “Though, you are not a king this time, not outside of your castle. That’s neither here nor there, however.”  
  
“Does he have a name?” asked the young master, who liked facts and figures and things that were tied up in bows and had a foolish tendency to assume all creatures had names like humans did, even though many did not.  
  
“He did once,” said Nemesis. “It hasn’t been his for a long time now, so it doesn’t matter in the slightest though. He would not carry it with pride. But you do know him– I can see it in the look on your face. He is hardly as fragile as he appears.” She laughed at the notion. “Old things, old monsters rarely are. It is young things that break at a touch, not us, never us, cruel as the thought may be.”  
  
“Undertaker can’t be involved in this,” the young master declared suddenly. “He knew my father.”  
  
“And your grandfather, and dozens of others,” Nemesis replied. “Knowing people doesn’t make someone any less involved– if anything, it makes one more involved in any given thing. A town gossip is as vital to her town as a priest or a mayor, you see– that’s why she must be invited to a christening.” The demon felt rather lost in the analogy, but Nemesis pressed on. “If one plays checkers, one mustn’t just stay on one part of the board, is what I mean. One piece may win you the game, but you need more than one piece to play. That is why it is vital, absolutely vital to know people– if you want to play.”  
  
“So, what? We should just confront him?” the young master asked dubiously.  
  
“Only if you want to pay,” Nemesis replied. “And if you want to get your bargains all tangled up together– that would be quite troublesome for everyone. They’re quite tangled enough as it is, what with yourself, and dear Sebastian– back then, of course, Messer – and that poor silly boy Faust, and your killer. Oh, and I would imagine that’s where – what did you call him – Ash went as well, though I couldn’t say if he made a bargain or tried to break one. It’s always said that demons cannot be trusted, you see, but truly, a demon is honest– service for a soul, set, done, through. The trouble comes when someone tries to buy and sell something else and comes around for a pound of blood– or was it flesh? I can’t recall.”  
  
“Flesh,” said Roxanne helpfully. “And not a drop of blood.”  
  
“Thank you, my dear,” said Nemesis. “I rather thought I had had it backwards.”  
  
“What Auntie means, I think,” Roxanne said suddenly, “is that you have to beat the fellow at his game. If he uses people like pieces, you just need to take all his pieces.” She grinned hungrily. “Seems like he has no trouble sacrificing them, anyway,” she added. “Better for you, if worse for Eric and Faust. And company.”  
  
“Yes,” said Nemesis. “People are at their weakest when they are well and truly alone. Remember that. It is difficult to be truly alone, but if you are, when you are… No good can come of that.” She picked up her knitting again and focussed on it this time, and the demon got the distinct impression that from this point on they would be dealing exclusively with old and gossipy Jane August.  
  
“By the way,” said the demon suddenly, if only to fill the silence. “Whatever happened to father Greyson?”  
  
“Oh, him,” said Roxanne airily. “He’s gone off, hasn’t he?”  
  
“To France,” said the blue-eyed demon. “For now. He goes where he is needed.” And the demon got the distinct feeling that Nemesis would tell them nothing else.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In proper Kuroshitsuji tradition, I'm ... borrowing characters. If you can guess who Roxanne, Nemesis, or Father Greyson are/are shameless ripoffs of, I'll dedicate the next chapter to you! :D Also, congrats to those of you who guessed who the Smiling Man was! Sebby is going to have a hell of a time figuring out who his pawns are, alas. ^_^


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, so guess who's back after... what, another six months? I'm sorry. This chapter's excuse is: I got published!! I am now a real life published author, and I think that's really exciting. That may have eaten the last half of 2015, yes. Buy my book? It's on Amazon.com and a bunch of other places; if you search "In the Snows of Haz" on your ebook platform of choice, it should come up. Please buy it and support your friendly(?) local(??) mystery nerd writer person. /endpitch
> 
> Now, on with the fic!

The young master decided to bully Prince Soma into not revealing anything as soon as they left Nemesis’s house. He didn’t need to bully much– the prince had gone silent at the first mention of demons, and now seemed to be stewing in his anger. The young master barely got two sentences out when the older boy cut him off. 

“Of course I cannot say anything about this!” he snapped. “What do you think? That if it is my word against yours someone will believe me? Not here!” Prince Soma gestured rather violently at the village in general. “Not in this country, where I am only a stupid and superstitious foreigner!” He paused, then shook his head sharply. “I will tell them it is demons, you will tell them I am mad, and then I will never see daylight again, because that is the way the English do it!”

“Soma,” the young master began, but he was cut off once again.

“Forget it. Come on, Agni– we’re leaving.” And without a backward glance he stormed up the street. Agni gave a short bow, and made to follow his master, but the demon caught his arm. 

“Is there something else you want to say?” Agni asked. He did know how to fake smiles after all, then. The realization felt rather like a blunt object to the face. 

“I was going to– I meant to tell you…” He’d meant for Agni to not find out like this, anyway. Him not finding out at all would have probably been preferable, but the present situation was only marginally better than him finding out from a very angry band of reapers. 

“No you didn’t,” said Agni quietly. “It is alright. I understand.” And then he walked away, following his master until they both turned a corner and were lost from view. 

The two of them left Saint Mary’s the following morning. It wasn’t a surprise. It should not, really, have been disappointing, either, and there was no reason at all for the feeling of a knife in his chest to return like that.

Nemesis had sent the young master and his staff on their way two days after they had arrived at Saint Mary’s. She had done so very politely, and after sending a letter to the mysterious Father Greyson, but her terms had been absolute. She was in no fit state to do battle with her former ally, and really no one had had the gall to suggest she try. At least, thought the demon, he had a target now.

———

When Miss Roxanne King knocked on the door of Phantomhive manor mere hours after their safe return, holding a neatly wrapped box and smelling a little less overwhelmingly of lilacs, the demon wanted to shut it in her face. She smiled at him brightly, shifted the box to her hip, and stuck one high-heeled foot in the door.

“Having considered the issue,” she said, “I want to help.”

“How?” the demon shot back. Her fanged grin faded a little. 

“The Smiling Man,” she said. “Auntie thinks you’re the sort of idiot who’d go after him alone, so I’m going to make sure you won’t get yourself killed. Because if you go and do something like that, apparently, it’ll all be a Gordian knot of really stupid bargains, and that’s not good for anyone.” She paused and tilted her head. “Besides, it technically is reaper business. You should let them have the glory on paper, I suppose.” There was not any glory to be had, the demon thought, but Roxanne King’s mind was clearly elsewhere. 

And just as clearly, the demon no longer had any say in who did or did not enter the manor, because a short while later he found himself brainstorming ways to hunt down a rogue reaper with Roxanne King, Grell, and the boy Knox, all of whom had entered entirely uninvited and promptly made themselves at home at the kitchen table. Grell had her chainsaw out and was very loudly of the opinion that the best option was a destroy everything between themselves and where they expected Undertaker to be and hope he got conked on the head during. Knox wanted to call in backup, because apparently reapers got backup on such matters, but Grell thought the only thing worse than calling in said backup would be telling Mr Spears that they were colluding with demons. 

“Will’s going to skin us bloo~dy~ if he finds out!” she added, slamming the chainsaw down on the table for emphasis. “And not in the fun way either! We’ll have overtime forever!” 

“But what if we just… don’t… tell him?” Knox offered hesitantly. “He’s functionally blind and if our paperwork looks good–“

“That’s why we have to do it ourselves!” Grell insisted. “That way no one can write up that we’re lying!” It sounded sensible enough, but their back-and-forth was giving the demon a headache. 

“Do either of you know where he is?” Roxanne King asked finally. Grell blinked. 

“Archives, probably. He got honorably discharged, see, so he’s still got top security access. If he’s not in his shop, he’s bound to be up there.” A beat. “I mean, probably. We’re creatures of habit, even the nutty ones.”

“And how does one get to the archives?” Roxanne pressed. Grell frowned. 

“With clearance,” said Knox. “Which I don’t think any of us have…?” Grell shook her head quickly. “Right, which none of us have. So, uh, I really don’t know.”

“So we break in,” said the demon wearily. Roxanne raised a perfect eyebrow. 

“That’s something easier said than done,” she said with a light laugh. “You really don’t know much about reapers, do you?”

“We can break in,” said Grell firmly. “Sebby may be an idiot sometimes, but I don’t think it’s impossible. I got in with Will’s card before, and I know people lie their way in for dea~dly secret ren~dez~vous, of course.” She frowned suddenly. “At the academy, people said you had to make the Archives like you, but I think that was a joke.” Knox perked up.

“Yeah, I heard it too! Eric thought it…” His face fell. “Never mind.”

“Eric knew something about the archives?” the demon pressed. Knox nodded glumly. He didn’t seem to want to talk about it, so Grell picked up the topic.

“He was hanging around in there a lot recently,” she said. “Someone from medical gave him a research pass, I think. Actually, if he’s still here…?”  
———  
Eric’s limp body hadn’t moved since the demon had last seen it, and there was an ink-stained pass in his pocket that Grell insisted was what she was talking about. 

“Won’t the Archives know we pinched it, though?” Knox asked. Grell shrugged. 

“We’re on a deadly important mission,” she said. “Get the Smiling Man, save Eric, put me back into HQ’s good graces… The Archive can shove it.”  
———  
It took another two days of hemming and hawing and investigating and increasingly complicated excuses about why Roxanne King was hanging around for Grell to be sure she could smuggle them in. She could– under cover of darkness and when she was on duty, but it was better than nothing. The demon made one final sweep of the manor before he left. It was quiet, like it often was at night. It only took a small dose of sleeping aid to make a child pass a silent night. He hoped to be back by morning, but just in case, he left a note pinned to the inside of Bard’s door, mentioning a case of treason he was to investigate and suggesting they call Agni if he was not back by lunchtime.


End file.
